


apologies can't fix broken glass

by artistic_mathematics



Series: but the truth can help mend it [1]
Category: Scooby Doo - All Media Types, Scooby Doo! Mystery Incorporated (Cartoon 2010)
Genre: Angst, Calculus, F/F, Fluff and Angst, High School, In fact if you've watched SDMI throw all of that knowledge out a window, Physics, SDMI spinoff of sorts, Slow Burn, You don't have to have watched SDMI to read
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-23
Updated: 2020-11-23
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:08:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27682672
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artistic_mathematics/pseuds/artistic_mathematics
Summary: When the members of Mystery Incorporated parted ways due to various external factors, they stopped interacting with each other entirely. Since then, Daphne has questioned her own reasons for leaving, and regretted not being on speaking terms with her childhood friends—especially Velma, who seems to actively avoid her every day in physics class.Two months later, she gets tired of her own moping and decides to make a move.
Relationships: Daphne Blake/Velma Dinkley, Fred Jones/Norville "Shaggy" Rogers (Background), Past Daphne Blake/Fred Jones, Past Velma Dinkley/Norville "Shaggy" Rogers - Relationship
Series: but the truth can help mend it [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2146797
Comments: 4
Kudos: 26





	apologies can't fix broken glass

**Author's Note:**

> >> A special thanks to papercheesecake for proofreading.

“This is pointless,” Daphne groans, throwing down her pencil. She’s not exactly sure what she’s done wrong in her math, but the answer key gives a different answer than the one she’s gotten. She scans her calculations again—gosh, pendulums are the absolute _worst_ —before deciding to give up.

 _If only I could ask Velma to check my math_ , she thinks wistfully. _If only the gang were still together. If only we continued talking to each other._

The rest of the gang is still all in Crystal Cove, of course, as they still attend school together, but they’re not… _together_ anymore. She doesn’t even remember the last time any of them even bothered to look at her as they passed each other in the hallways. They all seem to want to forget that they were ever a team, except her.

She misses their study groups, which were more just mini tutoring lessons from Velma as they all attempted to cram last-minute for their exams. She misses hanging out with her childhood friends, her closest and truest friends, as they all spoke to each other about various subjects. She misses their late-night capers, solving cases and pulling off monster masks to expose one greedy capitalist after another.

It doesn’t help that she’s reminded of them everywhere. As soon as the scent of good food reaches her, she remembers how much Shaggy and Scooby can eat on a daily basis, to the point that it’s unnatural and unsettling. Mundane, everyday objects have the ability to pull herself out of her stupor and think about Fred’s uncanny talent for coming up with ridiculous traps.

And Velma, well… Velma is _everywhere_ without even physically being there, especially in school. Every time she steps into a class, there is nothing on her mind except just how much Velma loves the class, how much time the other girl would spend gushing about calculus or Shakespeare (and then proceeding to complain how the class was too slow-paced for her taste). And the absolute kicker is that there are classes (namely, physics) where Velma is _actually there_ , across the room, solving word problems with ease and explaining the answer to the class as she scribbles calculations for the homework. She can practically feel the exasperation from the rest of the class when she raises her hand to give her lengthy explanations. It’s times like these where Daphne remembers vividly how she was Velma’s most attentive audience, and how Fred and Shaggy and Scooby all seemed to space out when the other girl began theorizing who the monster in their current case could be.

Daphne can’t even escape her in the comforts of her home. Velma is the one who continued solving mysteries when the rest of them parted ways, and every time she successfully solves a case, she’s on television with an almost modest smile. And Daphne can’t help wishing that she was there with her, with her best friend ( _former_ best friend, she corrects herself), sharing the joy and excitement. She often finds her thumb hovering over the ‘send’ button on her phone after writing a lengthy text about how she wants to rejoin her in solving mysteries, because she truly, _truly_ misses Velma.

She then shakes her head, telling herself that she _can’t_. She says it to herself, repeats it to herself, that she left the gang because of her parents, to the point that she begins _believing_ it. Her parents had been critical of their mystery-solving group. They want her to be like the rest of the family, drowning in success and fame.

 _But what do you want?_ a voice calls out to her in the back of her mind. _What is it that you want?_

What _does_ she want? She muses over it, trying to untangle her parents’ hopes for her from the list. What is it that she truly wants to do?

The truth is, she doesn’t know.

She clenches her teeth and wills voice to leave her head. Not knowing makes her feel weak, vulnerable. _Useless_ , even.

Daphne doesn’t like not knowing, and that’s why she joined the mystery gang in the first place. She doesn’t like not knowing who is behind a monster mask. Mystery Incorporated was the first and only real sense of _direction_ that she had.

_And now it’s gone, because—_

“Daphne!”

The voice startles her so much that she almost falls out of her chair. She catches herself just in time to compose herself before her mother enters the room.

“Yes?”

“Just wanted you to know that dinner will be ready in five minutes.”

She glances at the clock on her desk and nearly panics in response, because where did all that time go? How did she spend half an hour thinking about her _feelings_ of all things?

“…Daphne? Are you alright there?”

She blinks and turns around to face her mother, who’s peeking through her bedroom door. “Yeah, I’m fine. And I’ll be right there, thank you.”

Her mother smiles, but Daphne can’t help but to notice that it was a curt smile, the smile that mothers use when they know that there’s something wrong. And frankly, she’s terrified, because that could only mean one thing—the moment she goes downstairs to eat dinner, her mother is going to bring it up, and there’s absolutely nothing she can do about it, and she definitely does _not_ want to discuss her emotions with her parents.

If she was ever forced to talk about her feelings with anyone, her parents would be on the very bottom of that list.

She sighs audibly and glances back down at her physics homework one last time. _If it really comes down to it, I could ask… Velma… for help tomorrow. During lunch._

Is it really a good idea? It’s not like any of her friends have the same lunch period as her on Thursdays, so they won’t be around to judge her. Besides, she hasn’t talked to Velma since September, and it would be really nice to rekindle their—

_Physics. Physics talk only._

She stands up and begins to head downstairs for dinner, prepared for whatever insane and invasive questions her parents were planning on asking her.

* * *

“Is it you and the Fred boy? I’ve never quite approved of him.”

“What _has_ he been up to lately?”

Daphne bites back a sigh for the ninetieth time in the past three minutes. She was absolutely right about not wanting to discuss her emotions with her parents. Her denial only seemed to make it _worse_ —instead of outright asking her what her issue was, they had taken a more indirect route.

 _This literally couldn’t be worse_.

“Last I heard, after the whole incident with his father, he’s working to provide for himself at the burger joint on the boardwalk,” her father says. “The owner felt bad for him and hired him.”

“Uck, a _fast food restaurant_ of all places.” Her mother blanches in disgust. “Daphne dear, please do make sure to never work at a place like that, or I will never look at you the same.”

Daphne nearly spits out the steak in her mouth in response.

“It’s not like I even have a choice of where I want to work,” she retorts after swallowing her food.

“Of course you do, sweetheart, don’t be ridiculous!” her mother tries to reassure her, but her tone of voice only tells Daphne that she won’t be reassured at all. “You’ll be able to choose from all the different jobs in our company!”

 _And there it is._ “Have you maybe considered that I _don’t_ want to work at the company?”

Daphne has to resist the urge to roll her eyes when her father fake gasps and her mother begins to feign crying like they both haven’t heard this question a thousand times. It’s absurd, considering they’ve _definitely_ heard it before, and they’ve reacted the same way _every single time._

“You’re breaking your mother’s heart,” her father says, gesturing dramatically towards her weeping mother in such an exaggerated manner that she’s just about had it with the two of them.

“Oh my gosh, fine, I’m leaving,” she declares, throwing her hands up in mock defeat. She grabs her plate and utensils and begins stomping upstairs, more to make a point than to eat somewhere else, considering her plate is almost empty. Her parents call after her, but she pretends not to hear them. When she makes it to her room, she sets down her dinner and abandons it almost immediately for her bed.

She’s tired, she decides, as she leans back onto the padded headboard of her queen-sized bed. She’s not sure what’s made her so tired in the first place—it’s only 6:42 at night, after all. It’s probably not her parents, as their gossip and criticisms aren’t anything new to Daphne. There haven’t been any drastic changes to school, so it can’t be that either. She glances back at her table at her unfinished physics work and feels the weight on her shoulders drag her down even further.

 _Calm down_ , she tells herself, _just do one assignment at a time. You’ll be fine._ She knows, though, that her homework is certainly not the issue at hand since she only really has one real assignment left for the night.

_It’s fine, I… I need a break anyway. I’ll give myself ten minutes._

Almost immediately, her grip on reality begins to waver. The world begins turning black and she instinctively curls into the warmth, into the soft linen sheets. She can feel the voice from earlier creeping back into her headspace and she feels so lost, like she’s in the clearing of an endless forest—

She blinks and jolts upright, turning to check the time. 6:58pm. She squints at the numbers momentarily before practically dragging herself out of bed.

 _I can’t doze off like that_ , she scolds herself, plucking her calculus folder from her backpack. Rubbing the sleepiness from her eyes, she opens the folder and takes out her homework. _At least it’s just a worksheet this time, rather than the usual packet._ Daphne is especially thankful for that—she knows she wouldn’t be able to finish an entire packet. Heck, she’s not entirely sure she’ll stay awake for long enough to even finish the sheet of paper. And that’s not even considering her current attention span.

She grabs her pencil and begins working.

* * *

_“Come on,” Velma hisses, pulling on Daphne’s arm. “This way.”_

_“I’m coming, I’m coming,” she responds, allowing herself to get dragged along. She hates how shaky her voice sounds. The deserted building is unfamiliar and it really, really makes her nervous. She doesn’t like not knowing where she is. But Velma’s voice sounds confident, grounded, and she knows that she’d just about follow Velma anywhere._

_She stumbles after Velma as the other girl waves her flashlight around at the various paintings and artwork around them. “Just look at all of these Rembrandts,” Velma murmurs. “Wouldn’t be surprised if the ‘ghost’ is looking to steal a few of these. The originals are worth millions.”_

_“Oh, I know.”_

_She feels an urgent tug on her sleeve and she turns around to see Velma with an absolutely fascinated look in her eyes. “Your family has an original Rembrandt?” she exclaims. “Why didn’t you ever tell me?”_

_She smiles sheepishly. “It kind of makes you a target.” She shrugs at Velma’s apologetic expression. “Remind me to show you them sometime.”_

_The excitement in Velma’s eyes returns and Daphne wants nothing more but to finish this stupid mystery so she can take Velma to see her family’s Rembrandts._

_They keep trekking through the hallways as Velma cheerfully explains the mystery behind the painting_ Artist in his Studio. _They’re both distracted, she can tell, but Daphne has never been one to stop Velma when she’s talking about something she’s truly interested in. And besides, she’s never seen the other girl so happy about something before. Daphne always tells her that she needs to smile more, but the advice often goes unheard._

_She reaches for her hand and quickly laces her fingers with Velma’s. Velma immediately looks up at Daphne, stopping mid-sentence to search for her reaction. Daphne can only really muster a shy smile in response and Velma grins beautifully. Velma’s grip on Daphne’s hand tightens and her heart warms with so much elation that she thinks it might burst._

_Everything feels perfect._

_Too perfect._

_Out of nowhere, the Ghost of Rembrandt leaps into their path with a scream quite like the screams of terror the two of them emit as a response. Daphne lets go of Velma’s hand and they both run for it. As Daphne flees, she hears the unmistakable sound of glasses clattering to the marble ground, and time slows as she turns around and watches the ghost grab Velma’s arm._

_“My glasses!—Daphne, is that you? Help grab them for me, please!”_

_“That’s not me,” she yells from down the hallway. She changes her course and begins running right at the ghost, ready to teach him a lesson._

_But it was too late. The ghost lifts Velma up like she weighs nothing and begins flying away at a speed much faster than she could run at._

_“Velma!”_

_“Daphne!” Velma screeches. “Daphne!”_

* * *

“Velma!”

There’s something on her face. _It’s wet. Something’s wet._

She tentatively feels her cheeks. _Tears._

She was crying. _But why?_

She wipes the tears from her eyes and sits up fully. The lights blind her as she tries to open her eyes—it takes a few moments of adjusting before she can see anything beyond the color white. Her heart aches—it feels like there’s a hole that’s been cut from it. And her hand—there’s a lingering warmth that she can’t quite place, but one that she so desperately wants to feel again.

She feels sad. Why is she sad? She can’t recall anything sad happening recently.

_It doesn’t matter._

She shakes it off and glances at her clock to see what time it is—

_Crap._

She quickly observes her surroundings and it occurs to her that she fell asleep while doing her homework.

Her currently _unfinished_ homework.

She grabs her pencil and begins working, with much more urgency this time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome! I'm glad you could join me on this journey.
> 
> I hope you all have enjoyed thus far. This was an idea that occurred to me just two weeks ago. I don't normally post my chapter fics, because I never end up actually finishing them, but I saw myself actually writing the entirety of this one.
> 
> Tags will be updated as we go along, namely with new characters and miscellaneous.
> 
> I absolutely cannot promise a regular update schedule. In fact, don't expect one at all, because it most likely won't happen. College sucks.
> 
> With that being said... hope you all are doing okay amidst this pandemic. Feel free to let me know in the comments below :)


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